Fox News platforms climate denial and the Great Reset conspiracy theory during COP27

During the final weekend of the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference, known as COP27, two Fox News programs invited longtime climate denier Marc Morano to discuss the conference and link it to a conspiracy theory about the Great Reset.

As Media Matters wrote last week, adherents to the Great Reset conspiracy theory absurdly believe that global elites are using climate change policies in order to crush individual freedoms and install a global dictatorial government. Morano is a key driver of the climate denial components of this conspiracy theory. We also noted that given the high-profile nature of COP27 and the presence of numerous world leaders there, this conspiracy theory would proliferate within right-wing discussions of the conference.

And now, the most-watched cable news network in the U.S. has prominently featured the false claims in its discussions around COP27.

On the November 12 edition of Unfiltered with Dan Bongino, Morano stated that world leaders want to “use the COVID template to fight climate, i.e. authoritarianism, you don’t have a say, democracy goes to die.” He also falsely downplayed the health threats associated with climate change, wrongly dismissed the need for climate action as too expensive, and directly referred to COP27 as “the Great Reset summit.” 

Host Dan Bongino also brought up a key tenet of the Great Reset conspiracy theory, which is that climate change is all about control. He stated that the conference is “a totalitarian way to control things. This has nothing to do with climate science.”